Judge orders psych tests for man accused in 9/11 bomb plot

JACKSONSVILLE, Fla. (AP) — A judge on Tuesday ordered a mental evaluation for a young Florida man accused by the FBI of sending bomb-making plans to an informant for an attack at a 9/11 anniversary event in Missouri.

Joshua Goldberg, 20, appeared in federal court in Jacksonville for a hearing about his detention, but the judge sent him to a mental health facility in North Carolina for 30 days.

Goldberg, who lives with his parents in a Jacksonville suburb, was arrested last week after catching authorities' attention earlier this year in online posts under the moniker "Australi Witness," and others.

The FBI said Goldberg called for an attack on a contest for drawings of the Prophet Muhammad in Garland, Texas, and boasted about helping plan attacks on synagogues in Australia.

The FBI says Goldberg sent instructions to an informant showing how to make a pressure cooker bomb. He also suggested to the informant that a 9/11 anniversary event in Kansas City would be a good place to carry out the attack, authorities said.

Agents traced the messages to Goldberg's address, and after weeks of surveillance, arrested him on Wednesday.

According to court documents, Goldberg told an online acquaintance that he was actually just an "online troll" who liked to provoke others. He told investigators he never meant for the attacks to be carried out, and that he intended to tell law enforcement about it before anything happened.

He is charged with distributing information relating to explosives, destructive devices and weapons of mass destruction.